Episode 60. Medicinal herbs also bloom,
‘Damn it.’
Han Ibi returned to her dorm and cursed at herself.
‘I guess I was too excited after reading the strange memorandum asking if I was Sohae-ah or Sohae-adult. ‘I ended up asking questions I shouldn’t have asked.’
Because of this, Han Ibi even received a congratulatory order for the return of Yeonhwa.
Even if you keep sticking next to him, it won’t be enough…
Since that’s the case, strategy 2-2 can also be said to be a failure.
‘Farting to soothe a sulking Bok Yeon-hwa… is impossible for a man like me.’
Then I thought again.
‘Actually, it will be impossible to appease him… I have to wait until his anger subsides…’
That’s right.
The characteristic of the double-yeonhwa that Han Ibi identified is the typical ‘external and internal oil.’
This means that if you wait, it may be resolved.
Han Ibi thought.
‘Anyway, it’s ruined. It’s ruined. None of my ambitious plans worked… so what should I do now…’
Han Ibi sat on the bed holding her head and thinking about it over and over again.
It must have been about half o’clock….
Han Ibi jumped up from her seat and muttered.
“As expected… that’s the only way.”
At the same time, he left his lodgings and was busy walking somewhere.
* * *
I felt this last time too, but the village at the foot of Cheongseong Mountain was truly quiet.
Well, it seems like all mountain villages are like that…
‘The streets of Mt. Magok were full of energy…’
He was standing in place, waiting for someone to pass by.
I wonder if he had waited enough for about a meal… He finally found the person he had been waiting for so long.
He was an old man with a crooked waist, walking with a cane roughly made from a thick tree branch.
Ebi Han said.
“Hello, old man, how are you?”
Then the old man stopped in his tracks with a wary look in his eyes and said.
“Hol hole. “Hello…”
The old man frowned as he looked at Han Ibi’s face for a moment. It seemed like he was trying to remember who it was.
Han Ibi squeezed through the gap and quickly spoke.
“Elder. “I want to ask you something.”
“…Sure.”
“So… old man. Do you happen to know where the house of the old man from the Gu clan, the herbalist, is located?”
Then the old man relaxed his expression a little and nodded.
“Ah… you mean sincerity.”
Hmm… That old man’s name was ‘Jeongdeok’. So the full name is ‘Goo Jeong-deok’?
The old man turned around with difficulty and spoke as he barely stretched out his arms, which had become hardened by the passage of time.
“It’s an isolated house on the hill up there. “It’s a bit far away, but it shouldn’t be difficult to find.”
Then Han Ibi smiled, bowed her head, and said.
“oh my. Elderly. Thank you again. “Then take a look.”
When the old man heard that, he smiled happily and said,
“That’s right. “I don’t know whose son he is, but I like that he has a bright personality, which is unusual for young people these days.”
Then, in order to take a step back, I ‘chinked’ the tip of my cane and stuck it into the ground.
Han Ibi realized that the old man’s eyes were on her blue military uniform.
The old man opened his mouth with a stern expression.
“Are you… a disciple of the Blue Star Sect?”
Then Han Ibi quickly waved her hand and said.
“That’s not true. “It is true that I am here as a guest at the Cheongseong Sect, but I have some story behind it, so I just borrowed some clothes.”
“Hmm. “Then you are lucky.”
The old man smiled again and continued speaking.
“This friend of Jeongdeok absolutely hates people from the Cheongseong faction. “It’s really… so terrible… So, I was just trying to tell the young man that if he was from the Qingcheng Sect, he shouldn’t even dream of going there.”
“no. no. Besides, the old herbalist and I are already old. “The old man from the Gu family asked me where I was staying and told me to come find him.”
“Well, that’s the story. If you’re not a blue-hearted person, that’s fine. Then I will go…”
The old man disappeared again in slow motion.
Han Ibi said,
‘It really seems like they have become enemies with the Cheongseong faction… But it’s really strange why they live here.’
While thinking this, I was walking towards the hut on the hill that the old man with the cane had told me about.
* * *
Han Ibi thought.
‘wow! This is really amazing. Even if it were the garden of some kind of superintendent’s house, I would hardly believe it…’
That’s right.
The colorful colors of flowers were showing off brightly around the herbalist’s hut.
A very beautiful sight.
Even as she walked along the stone path leading to the cabin, Han Ibi couldn’t stop looking here and there.
But…
‘Huh? It’s quite beautiful, but it feels somewhat limited….’
That’s right.
Han Ibi discovered it.
Although it had a complicated structure, three types of flowers actually made up the majority.
One is red. Another one is yellow. And the other one was white.
Tiriring!
Tiriring!
Tiriring!
E.B. Han’s herbal encyclopedia rang loudly.
‘Ah… I wonder who isn’t an herbalist… He planted a lot of herbs in the front yard of his house. Tsk tsk tsk. If digging up hagi is not enough, planting it is another option.’
According to the information in the herbal encyclopedia…
the red one is ‘pomegranate flower’.
The spicy yellow flower is ‘Buttercup’.
And the flower as white as Sobok was ‘Houttuynia cordata.’
Come to think of it, not all three flowers are widely used as ornamentals.
However, seeing them bloom at the same time, their elegance was no less than that of ‘ornamental’ flowers.
Of course, we owe a lot to the owner’s ability to plant it so harmoniously.
As she thought about this and that, Han Ibi ended up in front of the house of Gu Jeong-deok, an herbalist.
Behind the house, a structure that looks like a ‘shrine’ can also be seen.
In this era, it was never valuable to have a shrine to ancestors at home.
‘I should probably stay home…’
thought Han Ibi and tried to pretend to be happy.
“Is the owner here?”
I waited for a while, but there was no news. Han Ibi called out to the owner a little louder.
“Are you there?”
Sigh!
The old wooden door slid open and a human doll appeared.
A familiar face appeared through a crack in the door.
He was the old herbalist who had faced the bear for a while and shared the hardships and sorrows(?) with him.
Han Ibi greeted me with a happy expression.
“hello? “Young man.”
Then Gu Jeong-deok also recognized Han Yi-bi and pretended to know her.
“No, who is this? “I guess you really came all the way to Ye.”
sure. I need to get paid.
However, Han Ibi spoke without showing any signs of it.
“I don’t know if it was rude to come here so suddenly.”
Gu Jeong-deok smiled as he opened the door wide.
“How rude… I didn’t ask you to come. Come on in. Fortunately, I was able to get some rest today because I stayed up late yesterday.”
Han Ibi entered the house under the guidance of the old man.
Then a terrible smell assaulted my nose. Another smell.
But it was so familiar.
Isn’t this the smell I was tired of when I lived with Song Myeong-cheon?
At the same time, the Herbal Encyclopedia was pretending to know and conducting an orchestra of screams.
In any case, Han Ibi could not stop thoughts of Master from passing through her mind without her knowledge.
Did you even read these thoughts? Gu Jeong-deok said cheerfully.
“People who come for the first time may hold their noses… but for herbalists like us, this smell is more delicious than any other fragrance. Ha ha ha ha ha.”
Okay…
I guess I’m not as bad a person as I thought.
After meeting each other in such an ordinary way.
Then the old herbalist said.
“Are you here to get money?”
An unexpected room.
As expected, he is an old man with a story.
Han Ibi smiled awkwardly and said,
“Ah… to put it another way… it’s something like that.”
“If it’s long, it’s long, or if it’s not, what does that mean? That’s why young people these days have no spine…”
Yes… But grandpa… You’re not trying to switch to old-timer mode, are you? You definitely don’t want to overdo it because you’re afraid they’ll ask for money!
At that time, Gu Jeong-deok spoke.
“Don’t worry, I received a reasonable price.”
“That’s good.”
“The herbalist was so surprised when I told him that I had captured Pacheonwoong. ha ha ha.”
Gu Jeong-deok continued to laugh to himself as he wondered what was so funny.
“I should have seen old Mr. Hwang beat up Pacheonwoong. It wouldn’t be a sight to see alone. A man puts an animal on the head….”
“Ego. Don’t talk about that somewhere else. “I’m embarrassed.”
“Well, anyway, I didn’t kill that fierce Pacheonwoong with one hit.”
“Stop putting them on planes… no, in palanquins. “I’m embarrassed.”
Squeak!
I heard a noise and saw that there was a bundle of coins that Gu Jeong-deok had thrown on the table.
I’m not familiar with the money system here, so I couldn’t get used to it… but it seems like a lot anyway.
Gu Jeong-deok said.
“Yeomso. Actually, I was waiting for it to come now or the other day.”
When Han Ibi saw the bundle of money, she felt a little shaken.
‘Should I just… take it…?’
But I shook my head in my heart and said,
“I’m sorry, but there was something I wasn’t honest about.”
The old man asked with a puzzled expression at Han Ibi’s unexpected remark.
“What do you mean?”
“Actually… I am not a disciple of the Qingcheng Sect. To put it bluntly… you could say he was a guest of the Qingcheng faction. The reason I told my old man that I was a Cheongseong sect that day was because it was complicated to explain, and when I told him I was a Cheongseong sect guru, the village people covered it up and treated me well. sorry.”
Gu Jeong-deok said, nodding his head as if he could see it or not.
“Well, that can happen in life, right? Anyway, Sohyeop is my benefactor, so it wouldn’t be human to make an issue of something like that.”
“I’m glad you said that… But…”
Han Ibi paused for a moment, then swallowed her saliva and continued.
“…You can just keep this money.”
Then it was the old man who was surprised.
“No, what do you mean? Are you saying you don’t trust me? “I divided the stake exactly in half, so there is absolutely no doubt about it.”
Then, what about the money from selling the remaining parts….
“If you have any doubts, you can go to the apothecary together.”
Of course, you must have agreed with the person called Mr. Hwang. But I won’t ask you anything like that today. I only….
“I didn’t mean that. “You must have noticed it too.”
Gu Jeong-deok and Han E-bi’s gazes were intertwined for a while, not expecting them to separate.
Then, with a deep sigh, it was Gu Jeong-deok who turned his head first.
“As expected… Do you need Lee Ham Jong-su’s roots?”
Han Ibi nodded quietly.
Then the old man added in a somewhat serious voice.
“The person who is sick is… your friend?”
Han Ibi nodded again. Gu Jeong-deok spoke again.
“Then he probably isn’t a Cheongseong faction like you.”
Han Yi-bi looked into Gu Jeong-deok’s eyes for a moment. Then he quickly shook his head.
This old man has the power to see through lies.
It’s not like I’m very quick-witted.
Then, unexpectedly, the old man let out a loud sigh as if the ground was sinking again.
“I wish Sohyeop had lied. “As expected, I have an accurate eye for people… I thought it would end up like this.”
While Han Ibi’s eyebrows were raised, the old man added.
“If I had lied… I might have pretended not to know and let Lee Ham Jong Su-geun pass on.”
Ebi Han said.
“Then maybe you can skip it this time? please. That friend is a young girl from the Qingcheng faction. “I am addicted and am wandering around the edge of death.”
It’s actually not related to life or death, but… Well, I guess you can understand this level of nonsense…
Gu Jeong-deok raised his head and was lost in thought for a moment. Then, he looked at Han Yi-bi and said.
“I swore that I would never help the Qingcheng people in my life.”
(Continued in the next part)
